Drones: Grounded Harder Than You Think

John Stossel's latest column -- and video, which I'm embedding below -- are worth your time and are both incredible for two very different reasons.

Let's start with the positive side of the ledger. Stossel's six minute video will be an eye-opening demonstration (or reminder) of the potential for this new and rapidly evolving technology to improve our lives.

"Companies like Wing and Zipline bring people hot meals in under 10 minutes. I had to watch it to believe it." -- John Stossel

Even though the technology is relatively new, and many people remain unfamiliar with it, enough people are that market feedback has led to impressive improvements. People who grouse about propeller noise, for example, may be surprised at how quiet some of the newer models are, if they notice them at all.

On to the negative side of the ledger: As amazing as this technology is, the sheer obduracy of the regulatory state is giving it a run for the money. Stossel touches on this a couple of times:

Drone delivery was supposed to be common years ago. Jeff Bezos told 60 Minutes he expected Amazon to be sending out drone deliveries by 2017.

But most of us still don't have it. Why?

And later:

President Donald Trump hopes to speed that process. He signed an executive order telling the FAA to fast-track drone deliveries by allowing drones to fly beyond line of sight.

But he did that more than a year ago. Government is, as usual, so slow! The FAA didn't even respond to Trump's order for months.

If you think that's bad, this is on top of something I commented on nearly eight years ago:

The President who wanted to remove two old regulations for every new one recently signed into law the FAA Reauthorization Act, which repeals an old statutory exemption from FAA rules for model aircraft, such as drones. The new law will take some time to take effect...

What happened to that? is just about all I can say. Unlike today, that was one of the few times the President bothered to involve the legislature in an attempt to affect a policy. It would seem to have had absolutely no effect.

Considering this in very general terms, I'd say this may be a case of things being earlier than you think on a front for the battle for freedom. This President has no principles and never bothers to articulate why he wants to achieve anything. As a result, he has blown two opportunities to build momentum for a much-needed revision of a policy that is crippling a new sector of the economy. And that sector, as we are seeing in Ukraine and the Middle East -- and can thus easily imagine -- has national security implications.

And yes, China is already way out in front of us.

-- CAV